The invention relates generally to machine analysis, diagnosis and identification of persons and more particularly relates to the use of metering and computing circuitry for detecting and processing data which represents the polarization shift effected by a portion of a body.
Substantial research and development is currently being done in interfacing human beings and electronic circuitry. For example, in bioengineering work is being done in the harnessing of electronic technology for diagnosing and treating disease. In the area of electronic computers used for business data processing, systems are being sought for the rapid, accurate and automatic machine identification of persons.
In the medical field, circuits have been disclosed for measuring the electrical impedance of portions of the human body. Such circuits are disclosed for example, in U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,085,566 and 3,340,867.
Still other circuits, such as that shown in U.S. Pat. No. 3,334,622, operate on a sonic radar principle utilizing the receipt of echoes to detect the position of organs and other anatomical features of the human body. Another system disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,653,373 applies a sharp blow to a human tooth and records its subsequent oscillation to provide a graph which can be subjectively analyzed by a medical professional to give an indication of peridontal health.
Computer aided identification of persons provides for rapid and automatic determination of the identity of a person prior to admitting that person to a security area or to giving that person access to sensitive data stored in a computer memory. Similarly, such machine identification may be used in credit transactions. A person seeking credit would not only present his credit card to a clerk but in addition would be subjected to machine interrogation and identification to confirm that this person is actually the one who owns the card being presented and is approved for the extension of credit.
Previous attempts to design a computer identification system have been directed toward such things as voice print identification, finger print identification or automatic signature identification. U.S. Pat. No. 3,639,905 discloses an automatic identification system which measures the electrical resistance of the skin surface and additionally measures both the shadow of the human hand and the pulsations of surface reflections from the fingers of the hand.
I have discovered an apparatus for use in both the identification of individuals and the diagnosis of the health or disease condition of a portion of a human body.
The use of embodiments of my invention will be helpful in determining, by way of example, the condition of a fractured bone and its healing progression and possibly the condition of arterial disease, tumor growth, bone aging or deterioration. Other uses such as those suggested in my U.S. Pat. 3,872,443 also have potential with embodiments of the present invention.